622 Quotes About Absence

How can you know what is missing if you’ve never met it? You must know of something’s existence before you can notice its absence.

What? Do you dare smile and suggest for a moment that just because of the Absence between us I cannot make myself vivid to you? Ho! Silly boy! Don't you know that the plainest sort of black ink throbs more than some blood—and the touch of the softest hand is a harsh caress compared to the touch of a reasonably shrewd pen? Here—now, I say—this very moment: Lift this letter of mine to your face, and swear—if you're honestly able to—that you can't smell the rose in my hair!

...those absent can feel more present, do more damage, than any warm body in the room.

At a certain age we forget to be afraid of people. We start to dread, instead, their absence.

And it seemed to me that I was closer to him during those early months of his absence than at any other time of my life.

Before bereavement, one might think of 'death' but not yet of 'absence'. Absence is inconceivable, as long as there is presence. For the bereaved, the world is defined by absence.

Your chair at the table is empty and cold, you need to come home, I need someone to hold.

C'est fou comment le manque peut occuper une place aussi grande, un abîme qui risque un jour de m'emporter.

I wondered if the space that a person occupies in the world survives the person themself.